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Valledupar fire, 2 March 2016 El Copey, Valledupar

Out · last detection 16 Mar 2016, 18:31 UTC

The fire started on 2 March 2016 in Valledupar, Colombia, and satellites saw it burning for 15 days. Copernicus’s global GWIS system rebuilt a burnt perimeter of 4,490 hectares from heat detections, spread across 2 municipalities.

It is the 8th largest in Cesar since 2016 (of 60 with a page). Number 24 in Colombia in 2016, of 160.

Burnt area
4,490ha
GWIS perimeter (Copernicus)
Duration
15days
2 Mar 2016 – 16 Mar 2016
Municipalities hit
2
municipalities
Started on
2 Mar
2016
Heat detections
194
in a single hotspot: 37 MW
Danger at start
30
High · FWI index
Energy released
1.1GW
sum of detected power

Where it burned

16 Mar 2016
HOTSPOTS BY DAY 2 Mar16 Mar

How it evolved, day by day

2345678910111213141516

Fire radiative power detected each day, in megawatts, and number of hotspots. The magenta bar marks the peak day.

The weather it burned in

37°high
42km/h · peak gust
19%lowest humidity

It had gone 13 days without rain (1 mm or more) when it started.

This area had burned before

No earlier perimeters overlap this fire since 2016, when the satellite record begins.

What happened to each town

  1. El Copey
    2,363 ha reached on 5 Mar
    2.5 %
  2. Valledupar where it started
    2,153 ha reached on 2 Mar
    0.5 %

Burnt area inside each municipality, from crossing the GWIS perimeter with administrative boundaries. The distance is from the town centre to the nearest fire: staying a kilometre away does not mean it reached the houses.

The weather day by day

ECMWF ERA5 reanalysis at the fire location, the standard reference for past weather, and the Canadian Fire Weather Index (the same system Copernicus uses), computed by WorldFires from that data. Days after the fire run until the first rain.

Open-Meteo.com (CC BY 4.0) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (ERA5)

Day High Min. humidity Peak gust Rain Danger (FWI)
2 Mar 36.6 °C 29 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
3 Mar 35.1 °C 31 % 34 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
4 Mar 35.8 °C 29 % 28 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
5 Mar 35.1 °C 33 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 32
6 Mar 34.3 °C 37 % 34 km/h 0.2 mm High 32
7 Mar 32.4 °C 46 % 26 km/h 1.9 mm Low 10
8 Mar 36.3 °C 30 % 33 km/h 0.3 mm High 27
9 Mar 35.5 °C 23 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
10 Mar 35.4 °C 30 % 42 km/h 0.0 mm High 37
11 Mar 33.9 °C 33 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
12 Mar 35.9 °C 19 % 32 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
13 Mar 35.0 °C 23 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
14 Mar 36.8 °C 24 % 26 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
15 Mar 35.2 °C 33 % 27 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
16 Mar 36.2 °C 34 % 31 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
17 Mar after 34.8 °C 36 % 34 km/h 0.1 mm High 31
18 Mar after 35.4 °C 35 % 29 km/h 0.0 mm High 30
19 Mar after 36.8 °C 30 % 30 km/h 0.0 mm High 31
20 Mar after 35.3 °C 37 % 30 km/h 0.3 mm High 30
21 Mar after 36.1 °C 38 % 27 km/h 0.5 mm High 30
22 Mar after 34.3 °C 35 % 47 km/h 0.0 mm High 36
23 Mar after 36.4 °C 28 % 41 km/h 0.0 mm High 34
24 Mar after 36.7 °C 32 % 36 km/h 0.0 mm High 33
25 Mar after 37.0 °C 27 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 35
26 Mar after 38.2 °C 24 % 35 km/h 0.0 mm High 37

Before and after, from space

Drag the line to compare the same ground before the fire and after it.

Before · 24 Feb 2016
After · 23 Mar 2016

If the day is cloudy, change the date: each satellite passes once a day. In false colour the burnt ground looks brown or red.

Detections table · 194Every satellite heat detection, one by one, with time, satellite, power and coordinates.
⬇ Download CSV Times in UTC. Each detection is a 375 m pixel: a large fire yields hundreds per pass.
Date and timeSatelliteFRP (MW)LatLon

Other fires nearby

All fires in Colombia ›

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Valledupar fire last?
GWIS (Copernicus) dates it between 2 March 2016 and 16 March 2016: 15 days between the first and last heat detection of the perimeter.
How much area did it burn?
The perimeter GWIS (Copernicus) rebuilt from heat detections is 4,490 hectares (44.9 km²). It is an estimate: official national figures may differ.
Which municipalities burned?
The fire entered 2 municipalities: El Copey (2,363 ha, 2.5 %); Valledupar (2,153 ha, 0.5 %).
What was the weather like?
During the fire the temperature reached 36.8 °C, humidity dropped to 19 % and gusts hit 42 km/h. The fire danger index (FWI) reached 37, class High.
Where does this data come from?
From the GWIS (Copernicus) burnt perimeter, NASA FIRMS VIIRS hotspots and the administrative boundaries of Colombia (geoBoundaries). It is not an official report.

Where to verify it

A satellite detection is not an official report. Final figures and the fire’s status are published by each country’s emergency service.

Emergency number: 123 · 119

Satellite cross-check

Does something look wrong on this page?

This page is built from satellite data and official records, and it sometimes gets things wrong: the wrong dates, the wrong town, two fires merged into one, or something that was not a wildfire at all. If you know this fire first-hand (you live nearby, saw it, fought it or reported on it), tell us what really happened and we will check it.

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We will only use your email to reply about this report. Privacy. This is not an emergency service: if there is a fire now, call 123 · 119.

Where this data comes from

The perimeter comes from the Copernicus Global Wildfire Information System (GWIS), which rebuilds it from MODIS and VIIRS heat detections and publishes it under CC BY 4.0. It is not measured on imagery as in Europe, so it is an estimate. Heat detections come from the VIIRS sensors aboard Suomi-NPP and NOAA-20, distributed by NASA FIRMS at 375 m resolution. Municipal boundaries come from geoBoundaries ADM2 (Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)). The area per municipality is computed by WorldFires by crossing the perimeter with those boundaries, so it may differ from each country’s official figure.